Category Archives: Lawsuits

Plaintiffs’ lawyers were falling over themselves last week in a race to the courthouse to sue Target as a result of its recent data breach. By at least one report, over 40 lawsuits have already been filed against Target, the first of which was filed the day after the breach became public. This post will… Continue Reading

A client recently asked me to identify the next wave of data privacy litigation. I said that with so much attention on lawsuits arising from data breaches, particularly in light of some recent successes for the plaintiffs in those lawsuits, the way in which companies collect information and disclose what they are collecting is flying… Continue Reading

Just when you thought it might be safe to go back into the water, another significant data breach lawsuit may be settling. Last week, I wrote about the proposed settlement in the AvMed lawsuit. The motion for a preliminary proposed settlement in that case was granted on Friday, and a Final Hearing is set for… Continue Reading

How much of a headache can a couple of stolen laptops cause your organization? How about a $3 million headache?? That is the amount of a settlement proposed in an Unopposed Motion in Support of Preliminary Approval of Class Action Settlement in Resnick/Curry v. AvMed, Inc., No. 1:10-cv-24513-JLK (S.D. Fla.), a data breach lawsuit pending in the Southern District of… Continue Reading

Plaintiffs in data breach lawsuits around the country have had a difficult time surviving motions to dismiss and for summary judgment. A number of courts have rejected these lawsuits because they failed to allege or demonstrate cognizable injuries, standing, causation, and the requisite elements to withstand an economic loss rule defense. It is dangerous, however,… Continue Reading

If you have noticed an increasing number of high profile problems for healthcare organizations with respect to privacy and security issues these last few weeks you’re not alone. The issues have ranged from employee misuse of protected health information, web-based breaches, photocopier breaches, and theft of stolen computers that compromised millions of records containing unsecured… Continue Reading

Until recently, individuals whose information was compromised as a result of a company suffering a data breach faced an uphill battle when suing the company in a class action lawsuit. Far more often than not, Courts dismissed the lawsuits or entered summary judgment in favor of defendants on grounds that the plaintiffs could not establish… Continue Reading

The following Data Security Law Journal post was authored by Becky Schwartz, my law partner at Shook Hardy & Bacon. Becky is an experienced class action litigator who has developed a specialty in privacy litigation. In this post, Becky discusses a recent U.S. Supreme Court decision that may make it more difficult for consumers to… Continue Reading

Are you a victim of identity theft when your personally identifiable information is stolen? Is the theft alone, and the risk that your information may be misused, sufficient? Does your information have to be misused in some fraudulent manner before you can be considered a victim? A federal appellate court recently weighed in on these… Continue Reading

It is sometimes easy to forget with the increasing mobility of electronic information and our ability to “work from anywhere” that behind our office laptop, desktop, or tablet computing device is a network of servers that may be located anywhere in the world. When we hit “send”, “save”, or “open”, we use the network to… Continue Reading

Late last week, another Federal District Court (the Southern District of Florida) weighed in on the circumstances under which a plaintiff may sue a breached entity civilly for damages when the plaintiff’s personally identifiable information (PII) is inappropriately accessed or acquired. The Court allowed the case to proceed with counts for violation of Florida’s Unfair… Continue Reading

Last week, the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit decided Resnick v. AvMed, Inc., No. 11-13694 (11th Cir. Sep. 5, 2012). The Court’s opinion addresses some important issues regarding an individual’s right to bring a private lawsuit when her personally identifiable information or protected health information is compromised. In its decision, the… Continue Reading

Another court has weighed in on the issue of what constitutes a cognizable injury in a data breach case. In a lengthy opinion, the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Kentucky in Holmes v. Countrywide Financial Corp. dismissed a lawsuit against Countrywide by plaintiffs who claimed that their personal information had been compromised… Continue Reading

Following my post on the subject last week, I had the chance to speak with Colin O’Keefe of LXBN regarding the class action suit filed against LinkedIn following their recent high-profile data breach. In the brief interview, I explain the background of the case, what damages the plaintiffs are alleging and why it’s too early… Continue Reading

Well THAT didn’t take long! Less than 10 days after LinkedIn announced that it suffered a data breach of approximately 6.5 million user passwords, a class action lawsuit was filed against it in California federal court seeking in excess of $5 million. The lawsuit alleges that, contrary to its Privacy Policy, LinkedIn failed to comply… Continue Reading